OMS Community Room

The revitalization of the OMS Community Room (aka The Bingo Hall) began with a T-Mobile Hometown Grant. These grant funds allowed for the restoration of the building interior through upgraded lighting,  interiors, roofing, and flooring. In December 2023, the American Red Cross Community Adaptation Program and Osceola Main Street signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to formalize our partnership and collaboration.

In partnership with the Red Cross, we identified strategies to incorporate the initial components of a Resilience Hub in the Downtown Osceola Community Room.  These strategies included:

• the installation of a generator for resilient power
• the availability of disaster/emergency preparedness kits
• charging stations for continuity of communication in disaster disturbance
• purchase of refrigerator/freezer unit for safe food/medication storage in disaster disturbance
• website development for outreach and communication

inspired by the announcement of the EPA Community Change Grant, Osceola Main Street  and Red Cross began working with the City of Osceola to discuss the funding opportunity and the expansion of disaster resilience resources in Downtown Osceola.  Accomplishments through this collaboration include:

• weekly meetings from March through September to discuss community resilience efforts and climate action strategies in preparation for the Community Change Grant application.  While this team ultimately made the decision not to move forward with the application for this funding opportunity, the strategic planning that occurred during these meetings helped the team to collect and analyze data for future funding opportunities and will drive meaningful engagement and action in disaster mitigation planning.
• listening sessions with community residents, leaders, and stakeholders to gather input about current challenges and strengths, and to discuss activities to improve resilience efforts.

We connected with Main Street America to discuss their disaster resilience and emergency preparedness efforts and the included a mention of our awesome collaboration in our Main Street Disaster Resilience Toolkit".  This NATIONAL publication was created in partnership with the National Park Service and was informed by three years of study, listening to the needs of the main street network, and convening experts and stakeholders for a series of disaster planning and resiliency workshops and trainings.  In the recent release of this toolkit, our partnership is indeed highlighted on page 73 - be sure to check it out!

We held our first CPR/First Aid/AED training course at the Main Street Osceola Community Room.  We also began discussions with staff from the UofA Extension office to identify partnership opportunities with educational programming and resources.

Osceola Main Street board members attended the Resilience Hub training hosted by the American Red Cross in Dallas, TX.  During this training, they learned more about the implementation and operations of a resilience hub.

Osceola Main Street partnered with Red Cross and the City of Osceola to host a Community Engagement & Planning Meeting and to conduct a community survey about disaster resilience and emergency preparedness.  There were 369 surveys completed by downtown Osceola residents that will help drive the future planning of disaster resilience and emergency preparedness activities.

After continued discussions about the next phase of the resilience hub, including the renovations necessary for the kitchen and bathroom areas. the Red Cross made an investment in the purchase of equipment and renovation expenses to support the improvements needed to the kitchen and bathroom areas of the Main Street Osceola Community Room to expand the services available through the resilience hub.  The Osceola City Council voted to approve an investment of an additional $15,000 which was needed to complete the project. Thanks to this investment, the expected renovation costs of the resilience hub project will now be fully funded through this collaborative effort.

In 2025, we plan to continue our collaboration by:

• supporting the completion of the resilience hub renovation project
• utilizing the renovated community building to host additional training, educational opportunities, and community events
• continuing to expand the network of community partners and stakeholders in downtown Osceola
• continuing the development of a Downtown Osceola Disaster Resilience Committee, guided by the Main Street America Disaster Resilience Toolkit
• continuing to explore and diversify funding sources to expand disaster resilience programming